


Retribution

by Khashana, read by Khashana (Khashana)



Series: Disrespect!verse [13]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Dissociation, Found Family, Gen, Implied/Referenced Self Harm, Injury, Jet kicks ass, Panic Attacks, Sokka’s schedules, brief appearances by everyone else who's ever shown up, jetko is even briefer this time, lowkey a legal drama, mild suspense, narrative bookends like no tomorrow, see how many you can count, this is a power fantasy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-30
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-17 04:01:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29093877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khashana/pseuds/Khashana, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khashana/pseuds/read%20by%20Khashana
Summary: Ozai finds out Azula isn't his anymore.Thing is, Zuko has the entire combined force of Team Avatar and the White Lotus behind him this time. Plus some extras.
Relationships: Jet/Zuko (Avatar), Zuko & Azula, Zuko & The Gaang
Series: Disrespect!verse [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1782586
Comments: 71
Kudos: 194





	1. Redress

**Author's Note:**

> Only justice will bring peace. –Avatar Kyoshi
> 
> Still indebted to willowoak_walker for helping me work through the plot, and huge thanks to hereforthefic_onlythefic for legal SME and logistics/flow beta!
> 
> This picks up immediately after _Disrespect._

Eventually, Team Avatar uncurls and allows Zuko to sit up again.

“Let’s video call Suki,” suggests Sokka.

“You don’t need to,” says Zuko. “I’m okay.”

“Well, tough. I miss Suki. It feels weird not having her here.”

And that’s how, a minute later, Suki is waving at them from Sokka’s phone.

“What’s up over there?”

“Zuko got triggered, so we’re having a cuddle puddle,” says Sokka.

“That sucks. You doing okay?”

Zuko waves at her over Sokka’s shoulder. “Yeah. Good to see your face.”

Suki puckers her lips like a kiss and props her phone against something to form a heart with her hands. Zuko grins.

His phone buzzes and keeps buzzing. He pulls it out. “Azula,” he says for Suki and Toph’s benefit, and answers it.

“Hello?”

Azula is crying, and Zuko tenses.

“Breathe,” he tells her, trying not to let the panic into his voice. “What happened?”

“Dad called,” chokes out Azula.

“ _Fuck._ ”

“Yeah.”

“Does he know?”

“Yeah. He called the school to ask about not being billed, and they told him I wasn’t enrolled. Or maybe just that he wasn’t on the hook for anyone’s tuition, I’m not sure exactly, but he knows.”

“Okay. We knew this was coming.” Honestly, they’d expected this to happen sooner. Azula didn’t go back for sophomore year back in August, meaning that Ozai should have been billed even earlier, and it is now October. “What did you tell him?”

“I hung up on him.”

“Good. The game’s up, so you should block his number.”

“ _Zuko.”_

Fear runs down his spine at her tone. “What?”

“He texted me. Sending you a screenshot.”

He pulls the phone away from his ear.

_Dad: Remember I am still your father and I can still have your phone tracked._

“ _Shit_ ,” says Katara, reading it over his shoulder.

“You have to get out of there,” says Zuko through a throat that feels like it’s closing up. “Come to me—wait, no. That’s the next place he’ll look.”

“Mai?”

“I’ll call her.”

“Okay.”

“Tell Uncle, pack a bag, and turn the phone all the way off. I think it has to be on to be tracked, but leave it home to be really sure. Get Uncle to find you a burner. He’ll know where to look.”

“Okay. Love you. Bye.”

“Love you. Bye.”

He immediately unlocks his phone and calls Mai.

“Hello?”

“My dad’s coming after Azula,” says Zuko without preamble. “Can she come stay with you?”

A pause, and then, “No,” says Mai, and she actually sounds upset. “Zuko, I live with _Ty Lee._ I can’t ask that of her.”

…Zuko cannot believe he forgot about that.

“No, you’re right, you’re right. Sorry.”

“I’m sorry. Anything else, Zuko. But not that.”

“Yeah. Okay. Later.”

“Bye.”

“I’ll ask June,” says Toph, flicking her thumb across her phone screen quickly. She stands up and moves to the other side of the room as Zuko’s phone rings again. It’s his home number.

“Hello?”

“Zuko,” says Uncle, and the sound of his voice lifts a weight off of Zuko’s chest. Uncle doesn’t even sound stressed.

“Azula showed you?”

“Yes.”

“I called Mai, but she can’t take her.”

“I’m not sure where either of you got the idea that she should run away _alone._ I will reach out to the White Lotus, certainly, but if we have to, we can simply get a hotel room. I will not leave her. Ozai can do what he likes to the house.”

Zuko exhales and lets himself fall back against the couch back. “Right.”

All these years and he still forgets when he’s panicking that they can ask Uncle for something like that.

“June says she can take her,” reports Toph from across the room.

Zuko repeats the message to Uncle, who hums.

“See, we have an option already. What about you, Zuko? Are you safe?”

“We don’t even know he’s coming after me. I won’t stay in my dorm tonight.” He takes a second to be grateful that he’s certain he can find a floor to sleep on. There are too many people currently wrapped around him for it to be otherwise.

“Anyone got something going on this week that isn’t on their outlook calendar?” Sokka asks, engrossed in his computer, when Zuko hangs up. Katara and Aang are planning to take a first aid class the following weekend, and Sokka adds it to his calendar, then pulls out his big sketchpad and starts scribbling. After twenty minutes, during which a stack of post-its and an Xs and Os grid have been added to his project, he turns it around proudly. It’s Zuko’s schedule for the following week, with names next to every block.

“I figured tomorrow didn’t really make a difference since we can all hang out together,” Sokka explains, apparently not willing to wait for a reaction. “You sleep on Katara’s floor Sunday night, and she walks you to breakfast and Marine Geology, and from there to International Law in the space before her Water Pollution course. Aang doesn’t have class, so he’ll pick you up there, eat lunch with you, walk you back to your room so you can swap your things out, and walk you to work.” He doesn’t get a chance to finish, because Zuko tugs him into a hug.

He gets a text from Uncle a few hours later, giving him the number of the burner phone they’ll be using until this resolves one way or another. It makes sense—if Uncle is also running, keeping his own phone off is only a sensible security measure.

 _My friends have it in shifts to walk me everywhere so I don’t have to be alone,_ Zuko texts back, marveling quietly that this is a sentence he can type. Uncle seems to agree, because he texts back a row of hearts.

Aang puts him up for the night, and other than that, his Sunday is much the same as usual, except he would usually spend some of it alone in his room, and he doesn’t. He gets morning and evening check-in texts from Uncle’s burner, assuring him that they’re safe, but they don’t talk for long, mindful of the pay-per-use plan. (Zuko isn’t certain why Uncle has gone so far as to not use the family phone plan, and he figures the answer will only make him more anxious, so he doesn’t ask.)

He almost forgets to be nervous about seeing Pakku in Marine Geology the next day, but Katara is right there the whole time, and even Zuko’s hypervigilant brain can’t pick out anything different about Pakku’s behavior. The last of the disrespect-related anxiety fades away as he and Katara hustle to International Law. She’s already got her backpack packed to leave the second it’s over, and he loves her for it.

He’s prepared to have to hang around International Law waiting for Aang, but Aang surprises him by being there on time.

“I set alarms!” he tells Zuko proudly, and Zuko can’t help but grin at him. He lets Aang tell him about everything he learned today in Structure of Chinese over lunch. And then he has to talk Aang out of just hanging out at the fast food place where Zuko works for four hours.

“He doesn’t know I work here, and I am surrounded by people who will call the cops if I ask them to,” he says firmly. Not that he thinks the cops will do anything to Ozai in the long run, but it’s about as much safety as walking him everywhere provides anyway, and it seems to make Aang relax. After Zuko promises to call Aang or Sokka if he needs them, Aang finally leaves.

Work is as uneventful as it ever is, and at the end of it, Sokka is there, and something about his grinning face takes a weight off of Zuko’s shoulders. Sokka walks him to dinner, back to his room so he can shower and change clothes, and then back to his own room for the night. Zuko sleeps on his floor, and then Sokka takes him to breakfast and Democracy and Dictatorship, where Toph gets him.

“So you’re with me until silat at four,” she says as they cross the green. “You wanna grab your sweats for silat and then go chill at my place and not talk to each other for a few hours? Your ability to people has got to be shot after three days of never being alone.”

“ _Yes_ ,” says Zuko with feeling. He keys open the door to his building and they head up the stairs. As they round the bend to the second floor, the front door slams, and Zuko looks down to the ground floor by instinct.

He freezes.

“What?” whispers Toph.

“Jesus fuck, that’s him,” Zuko whispers back, and they take off at a run toward Zuko’s door. “What do we do?”

“Zuko, listen. Is there anything on your door or immediately visible in your room that would tell him it’s you?”

“Yeah, my _name._ ” It’s a gift from Sokka, a nametag that reads, ‘Here dwelleth Zuko, the mightiest motherfucker in eight counties.’

“On the door, right? Done. Anything else? Possessions he’d recognize? Is there a Star Wars comforter on the bed you’ve had since you were ten?”

They’ve reached the door now, and Zuko unlocks it and takes a second to scan. “No. I didn’t take a whole lot with me, and it’s been six years.” It’s not like his _Love Amongst the Dragons_ stuff is on _display._

“Cool.” Toph is patting the front door. She pulls the name tag off, grabs Zuko’s hand, and presses the tag into it. “Go down the other staircase. Run!”

He bolts. There isn’t time to stop and ask her what she’s planning, he can hear the staircase creaking and if he waits another second, his father is going to spot him. He runs to the fire exit at the other end of the hall and practically falls down the stairs. His phone rings in his pocket. Zuko bolts out the door, sprints to the next dorm over, and darts inside before he pulls it out.

 _Toph is calling you from a group chat,_ says the screen. Zuko answers it.

“—bastard has landed,” Toph is saying. “Record this.”

“Toph?” says Aang’s worried voice.

“What do you mean?” says Sokka.

“Hello?” Katara.

Zuko presses record.

“My dad’s here,” he says in a low voice. “Toph’s in my room. If you’re listening, Toph, I’m recording.”

He can hear knocking on the other end of the line and the sound of his bedroom door opening.

“Who’s here?” says Toph.

“Who are you and what are you doing here?”

Zuko goes cold all over. That’s his father, all right.

“I’m June,” says Toph. “I live here. Who are you?” Zuko has to hand it to her—she sounds mildly confused, not belligerent.

“No, you don’t. This is my son’s room.”

“Obviously it isn’t,” says Toph.

“You’re hiding him. Why would a blind girl have posters on the wall?”

“The aesthetic,” says Toph coldly. “Look. You see anyone else in here? Now leave before I call security.”

“Back away and let me see my son, little girl.”

“I don’t know your son, mister! And I’m not stupid enough to let strange men in my room!”

Ozai gives a little grunt, and the door slams shut.

“Calling campus security,” says Toph into the phone, and hangs up.

“Zuko, where are you?” asks Katara worriedly. “We’re outside.”

“In Merion.” Zuko ends the recording. Moments later, Katara bursts in through the front door, hits the hang up button, and throws her arms around him. Zuko hugs back hard.

“You there?” comes Sokka’s tinny voice from Zuko’s phone. Zuko puts it on speaker.

“We’re here.”

“So I’m thinking Aang and I stay here and keep an eye on your building, see if he leaves and back up Toph if she needs it, and you two go hang out in Katara’s room.”

“Okay,” says Zuko. Katara, very handily, _lives_ in Merion this year, and they start walking. Katara unlocks her door, and they sit on her bed in silence for what feels like forever but is probably only five minutes.

“Hello?” Toph has rejoined the call.

“Are you okay?” asks Zuko immediately. Toph doesn’t answer, but background murmuring resolves into voices.

“—if you could just come with us, sir,” someone is saying.

“This is a misunderstanding,” says Ozai smoothly. “I’m looking for my son.”

“I’m sure it is,” agrees the other voice. “But he doesn’t live here, so how about we take this downstairs?”

The voices move away.

“I think they’re gone,” says Toph.

“Let me come get you,” says Aang immediately. It says a lot that Toph doesn’t argue. A minute or two later, they join Katara and Zuko.

“That’s confused him, at least,” she says, and squawks as Zuko pulls her into a hug. He’s shaking, and so is she, and he doesn’t have any words, but she doesn’t need them.

“They’re only just now leaving Denbigh,” reports Sokka. “Must’ve taken a while for them to convince him to go. Aaaand, he’s walking away.”

Zuko exhales a loud, gusty sigh and falls back onto the bed. “He’ll be back.”

“Well, you’re staying here,” says Katara firmly. “Toph too. He’s seen your face now.”

“Don’t all of you have class?” asks Zuko, suddenly remembering that actually he and Toph are the only people who are supposed to be free right now. Katara gives him a Look.

“Zuko, if you honestly think we weren’t all watching our phones for this call, your self-esteem is worse than I thought it was.”

The funny thing is, when he thinks about it, he’s absolutely not surprised that they dropped everything and ran to help.

“Thank you,” he tells her, meeting her eyes for a second. She squeezes his hand.

“Speaking of which, I totally had a whole bunch of stuff out and didn’t have time to put it away, so I just left it there,” says Aang sheepishly. “So I’m gonna go back to class real quick and grab it?”

“You could just _go back to class_ ,” points out Zuko. “He’s gone for now.”

“You really think any of us could concentrate after that?” scoffs Sokka.

“It’s almost over anyway,” says Aang. Zuko remembers how much Aang loves all his courses this semester and is overcome by gratitude again.

Sokka and Katara take it in shifts to watch for Ozai returning, and Zuko can’t even bring himself to protest too much. They skip silat so Zuko doesn’t have to leave the building, and they’re probably all too stressed to be effective anyway. Aang and Sokka go on a food run and bring back enough dinner for everyone. Still, they don’t let up on the watch; Sokka takes his outside with him, swapping out with Katara.

It’s just getting dark when Zuko’s phone lights up with a video call from Sokka.

“Is that him?” Zuko squints at the screen, but even in the low light, he knows his father’s walk.

“Yeah, that’s him.” The picture shifts as Sokka stands up to get a better look.

“ _Hey, Ozai Himura!”_ The voice isn’t Sokka’s, but it’s familiar. Zuko squints at the screen.

“Jesus fuck,” says Sokka. A figure in the picture is sprinting toward Ozai, who’s wheeled around to see who’s calling his name. Zuko drops the remains of his dinner and races down the hall, almost running into several people when he doesn’t take his eyes off his phone. He reaches the windows that face the northeast corner of the building, and only then does he look up.

The figure is masked, impossible to make out in the dark, and Zuko is just in time to see him aim a flying front kick at Ozai’s chest. Ozai steps to the side, of course—you don’t have to be a martial artist to avoid a kick telegraphed from ten yards away, thinks Zuko—and moves to snag the figure by the shirt collar, but the figure follows up with a punch to the midsection.

Ozai staggers back.

The mysterious stranger pivots and lands a round kick to the ribs.

Ozai falls.

Zuko rushes through the front door just in time to see the figure stomp on his father’s face.

“That’s for my parents, you fucking capitalist billionaire prick!” And all at once Zuko knows where he’s heard the voice before, and he sprints across the grass barefoot, followed by everyone else.

“How the fuck did—”

“ _Well I have no fucking idea who that could have been,”_ says Sokka loudly, crossing the distance in a few strides to whisper, “ _Don’t say his name.”_

Zuko doesn’t understand, but he shuts up.

Jet, for his part, is long gone.

Suddenly, it hits Zuko that he’s standing mere feet from his father, who is still lying prone. Fear floods his veins, but it’s countered by a little voice saying _he’s not getting up._

He replays the fight in his mind and says, a little shakily, “Someone check his breathing?”

Katara edges closer, then jumps back. “He’s _awake,_ ” she says.

Zuko isn’t sure how he feels about that.

“Can you hear his breathing?”

“He’s awake, he’s definitely breathing—”

“Yes, but _what does it sound like?_ ”

Katara creeps closer, then kneels down beside him.

“It’s fucked all to hell,” she says, surprised.

“Hits to the floating rib and the xiphoid process,” says Zuko clinically, and feels himself start to dissociate. “Call 911. Tell them suspected punctured lung.”

“Jesus,” says Sokka.

A hand fits into Zuko’s.

“Sokka saw it happen, and Katara checked his breathing,” says Aang. “You don’t need to stay.”

“Call me when the police get here,” Toph tells Sokka. “I want to tell them it’s the same douchebag who was hanging outside my room.”

“Toph, no offense, but how the fuck would you know?” Sokka says in an undertone.

“ _You_ were there, Snoozles. I called you when he was in my room because I was afraid. You saw him leave.” She’s also speaking quietly, and Zuko knows there’s pieces to this he’s missing, but his brain isn’t working yet.

“…That’s not bad.”

“’Scuse you, it’s entirely true, which makes it amazing.”

“C’mon,” says Aang again, and Zuko lets him lead him back to Katara’s room. Aang deposits him on the bed and curls up next to him. “You should probably message your uncle?”

That’s a good idea. Zuko pulls out his phone and finds their recent chat.

_He’s here. He’s headed to the hospital. Think some guy punctured his lung._

Unsurprisingly, the phone rings, and Zuko stumbles his way through a summary of what happened.

“Can I talk to him?” Aang asks at one point, so Zuko hands the phone over and pretty much immediately stops processing speech. He drops his head into his hands and waits for his brain to come back online.

Eventually someone shakes his shoulder, and he looks up blearily. It’s Katara. She says something, and he just stares at her. She looks worried, but what is he supposed to do?

A notebook is pressed into his hand.

 _Is this better?_ is scrawled across it. Someone hands him a pen.

 _Yeah,_ he writes underneath. _Can’t do speech right now._

Katara takes the notebook back and adds _Do you want cuddles or to be left alone?_

_Alone_

_Okay. Try and sleep. You can stay right there._

He curls up on the bed and shuts his eyes. Someone shakes his shoulder after only a few seconds, and he opens them again to see the notebook shoved in his face.

_You want your weighted blanket?_

He nods and shuts his eyes again. An indeterminate amount of time later, he feels the blanket draped over him, and tension bleeds out of his muscles.

He sleeps.

When he wakes up, he has a crick in his neck and a stiff back, and he stretches, trying to crack the joints. He opens his eyes and finds that the sun is coming up. Katara is curled up asleep in a blanket nest on the floor, and everyone else is nowhere to be found.

He already knows he’s not going back to sleep, so he checks his pockets for his phone before finding it plugged into the wall, along with his laptop. He sits on the floor and cracks the lid.

“Zuko?” mutters Katara. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” he says, or tries to say. He has to clear his throat to manage it. “You can have your bed back. I’m awake.”

“Okay,” she mutters, and drags herself up into it, appearing to fall asleep again instantly.

Zuko checks his email. He has _class_ , which seems very weird after yesterday. Life is just going to _go on_ like he didn’t watch his old stalker send his father to the hospital. But when the page loads, he finds that Aang has emailed both his professors, who have both written back acknowledgements. He feels a wave of fondness for all of his friends. He still has work this afternoon, presumably because Aang can’t obtain his boss’s email address as easily as he can his teachers’, but that’s fine. It’s food service, it doesn’t require brainpower.

Instead, he goes to the dining hall and gets enough bagels and cream cheese for everyone, and sends the group chat a message to tell them to come back to his room for breakfast.

It’s still another hour before any of them show up, but then Sokka is poking his head in.

“Hey,” he says. “How you doing?”

“I’m good,” says Zuko, and means it. “Thank you for taking care of everything yesterday.”

“You’re welcome,” says Sokka, grinning crookedly.

“What did I miss?”

“Well, he went to the hospital. We told the police about him knocking on Toph’s door and needing to be escorted away, and then coming back later, and that this dude came out of nowhere and beat him up so we called 911. Nothing about you.”

“How the fuck did Jet know he was going to be here?”

Sokka looks sheepish. “I may have stopped in at his coffee shop on my way to pick you up from work on Monday and mentioned it, and he may have given me his number and asked to be kept in the loop. I didn’t tell him to beat your dad up, I swear.”

Zuko…isn’t mad about it, actually. Jet’s vendetta has nothing to do with Zuko, and it feels good for Ozai to get a little of what’s coming to him. Jet has no real ties to Zuko, so it’s unlikely to come back and bite either of them legally.

“So you told him you were keeping a watch on Denbigh and he just showed up?”

“Not even that! I texted him the first time, after Toph pulled the double-cross, and no answer. All I can think of is he was staking it out the whole time Aang and I were and just didn’t say anything.”

“Forgiveness over permission.”

“Huh?”

“If he’d shown himself, he’d have had to explain what his plan was, and then you’d have told him not to engage probably.”

“This keeps the story a lot cleaner if it goes to court, at any rate. Technically we don’t even know it was Jet.”

“So _that’s_ why you didn’t want anyone hearing me say his name.”

The others trickle in and out over the next couple of hours, and Zuko has a hug and a quiet “thank you” for each of them.

He skips Marine Geology, but decides to still go to International Law. He’s not really up for seeing Professor Pakku, and he can manage with just the textbook and Katara’s notes, but International Law is almost entirely lecture. Even if he zones out through a lot of it, it’ll be better than nothing.

He leaves early for work and sticks his head into Jet’s coffee shop. 

“What’s up, Mr. MCR Reunion Tour?”

Zuko makes the executive decision to ignore that baffling comment entirely and walks up to the counter. Jet arches an eyebrow at him. Zuko fists a hand in his lapels, drags Jet forward over the counter, and kisses him on the lips firmly.

He keeps it quick and chaste, and when he releases Jet, he has the pleasure of seeing him speechless. Zuko smirks at him and leaves before Jet can find his voice again.

He doesn’t go visit his father in the hospital. Neither does Azula, though her decision comes with more tears and less surety. After Ozai develops surgical complications, Iroh _does_. Mostly for medical decision reasons, but it does mean he leaves Azula alone at home, a decision that causes a small amount of drama, resolved on the agreement that Azula will call both him and Zuko every day and schedule extra therapy appointments. (“I’m eighteen! I managed away from home for an entire semester!” “This is a traumatic time for all of us,” said Iroh firmly. “I don’t want you to _manage._ I want you to _thrive._ ”)

“Complications” turns into full-blown _pneumonia,_ and Zuko schedules an extra therapy appointment for _himself._ He doesn’t give a single thought to Azulon or what’s going on with it while its CEO is in the hospital.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tell me why I have literally never seen a fic in which Jet gets to kick Ozai’s ass?? He deserves it


	2. Recompense

Zuko thinks it’s very inconsiderate of the board of directors to call him on the 21st of November, almost four weeks to the day since Jet put Ozai in the hospital. First off, it’s a Monday, meaning he has class tomorrow. If they’d had their shit together on Friday, he’d have had the weekend to process. Second, it’s Sokka’s fucking _birthday,_ and he’s spending it talking Zuko through a goddamn panic attack because the fucking board called and told him he now owns a company.

Because that’s a thing.

“While in temporary control of the company finances, evidence came to the board’s attention that Mr. Himura has been engaging in some, shall we say, less than legal practices,” said the lawyer who called.

“He’s been doing that for years, no one’s cared before,” said Zuko. Eventually he got out of the guy that the extralegal practices in question involved essentially robbing the board, who were major shareholders, blind (“No offense,” Zuko says to Toph. She just laughs at him). So, illegal activities that they’d care about, as opposed to human rights violations. Zuko’s not bitter.

“His assets have been seized, and he has been formally dismissed and taken into custody,” said the lawyer. “The contract states that if he is incapacitated or otherwise incapable of serving, than the interim position goes to his immediate descendant. Which is you.”

They need him to come to headquarters immediately for a board meeting and appoint an interim CEO if he doesn’t want to take full control of the company immediately. To which Zuko wants to shout, “I’m a college student! Of course I don’t want full control of a company, let alone this one!”

He’d walked back into the room. Katara had said, “Everything okay?”

And Zuko had had to say, “Yeah, my dad’s in prison and I own Azulon now.” At which point he had abruptly forgotten how to breathe, and now Sokka is lying bodily on top of him—something about the parasympathetic nervous system and the same principle as a weighted blanket—and counting breaths for him while Aang sits on his legs, Katara holds his hand, and Toph distracts him with a long, involved rant about how annoying every one of her professors is.

“I think you should call Uncle,” she says finally, not bothering to try and connect the sentence back to the story.

Zuko’s first impulse is _no, don’t bother him,_ but actually he legitimately cannot handle this alone, and Uncle is by far the best positioned to help.

He nods and fishes his phone out of his pocket. He gets as far as unlocking it before his breath starts to hitch again, so Katara takes it out of his hand and dials for him.

“Hello?” comes Uncle’s voice.

“Hey, Uncle!” chirps Toph. “We got you on speaker with the whole gang.”

“Hello, Toph. Hello, everyone.”

“Hi!” chorus Sokka and Aang.

“So you’ll never guess what just happened,” says Toph, “but apparently Zuko’s in charge of Azulon now.”

“The board has removed Ozai?” asks Uncle, surprised. “Do you know why?”

“They had to function without him, so they finally noticed he’s been embezzling from them for years,” says Zuko. “So he’s in prison. And he never wrote me out of his contract.”

“Oh my.” Uncle sounds truly rattled for the first time in a long time. “That makes you majority shareholder.”

“And president,” Zuko agrees. “And CEO. Unless I give somebody else that part.”

“Allow me,” says Iroh immediately. “It’s far too much responsibility to hand to a twenty-two-year-old boy. You’re a very capable young man, Zuko, but you have no business experience.”

“I’m not arguing with that,” says Zuko, snorting. The relief of sharing the burden is overwhelming, but also centering. He double-taps Sokka’s shoulder, and Sokka immediately climbs off, followed by Aang. Zuko sits up.

“When do they want you to come in?” asks Iroh. Zuko isn’t really surprised that Uncle has already gotten that far.

“Day after tomorrow.”

Sokka hisses in sympathy.

“I’ll book a flight for tomorrow,” says Iroh.

“Wait,” says Sokka. “The day after tomorrow is when break starts.”

“Why don’t we all go?” finishes Aang.

Zuko stares at them. “…You know you can’t just follow me into the board meeting.”

“So? We’ll be there for moral support, for after.”

“But—it’s your break.”

“Me and Katara aren’t going home anyway, it’s too far,” says Sokka.

“June will understand,” says Toph, shrugging.

“So will Gyatso,” adds Aang.

“Seattle is _farther,_ you know.”

“Yeah, but this is important. Besides, you’re rich now. You can help cover the cost of the flights.”

Zuko laughs a little. “I think they’re sending a plane, actually,” he says, and is surprised when the panic doesn’t kick back in.

“Jesus, you really are loaded now,” says Toph.

“That’s terrible for the environment!” complains Katara.

“Yeah, but look at it this way—what chance did five of us have of catching a flight to Seattle the day before a national holiday on no notice?” says Sokka pragmatically.

“It’s a _stupid_ holiday.”

“No one’s disputing that. But we’re being realistic.”

They disperse to pack, email their professors, and call their families. And the next day they all catch a plane to Seattle from a tiny local airport that has certainly never sent a plane to Seattle before in its life.

They’re met on the other side by Iroh and— “Suki?” Zuko exclaims, hardly daring to believe his eyes. “What are you doing here?”

She wraps him in a hug. “What kind of BFF would I be if I didn’t come when I literally don’t even have class as an excuse?”

If he were straight, Zuko thinks he would fall in love with her on the spot. As it is, he squeezes her tightly before releasing her to let her catch Sokka in a flying leap.

Azulon has a building for them to stay in so they don’t have to go to a hotel. Zuko has the penthouse suite. Sokka tries to claim it too, pointing out that it’s more than big enough for everyone, but Suki counters with the fact that Zuko might want a minute of alone time at some point. So he’s by himself when he stares up at the ceiling, unable to sleep or imagine what the next day will bring.

The board meeting is both not as bad as he expected and exactly as bad as he expected.

No one gives him trouble about handing the interim CEO position to Uncle. He still has to be involved as president, but this way he’ll actually be able to finish his degree, which had been a concern.

But—Zuko’s a _child._ Sure, he’s technically a grownass adult, legal to drink and everything, but _still._ And it’s never been more obvious as the board throw around words he doesn’t understand and look at him like he’s inconvenient and in their way, and he’s very aware that they wouldn’t have involved him if the legal department hadn’t made them.

And then he steps out of the boardroom, and finds that someone has told the press.

Of course they have. It’s major news, if he stops to think about it for two seconds. Ozai Himura got clapped in irons for embezzlement and his twenty-two-year-old son is taking his place? It’s _headline_ news. It’s amazing, really, that they haven’t gotten to him before.

“Mr. Himura, comment on your father’s incarceration?”

“Mr. Himura, do you think you’re qualified to run this company?”

“Mr. Himura, your stocks have plummeted in value. What do you have to say about that?”

“No comment,” says Zuko, over and over, pushing his way through. And then—

“Mr. Himura, will you be continuing your father’s policies?”

He stops and wheels around.

“My father’s policies of underpaying his employees, hiring everyone part time so he doesn’t have to pay them benefits, firing them before he has to pay worker’s comp, creating unsafe working conditions and buying out every lawsuit, buying newspapers to suppress anti-capitalist messages and keep strikes from getting any coverage, firing employees that try to strike? No. I most definitely will not.”

The reporters all start talking at once, and Zuko gets the hell out of there.

He gets as far as his room before he breaks down.

Uncle comes in to find him sitting curled in a ball in the massive bed, hands wrapped around his ankles and face resting on his knees. He doesn’t say anything immediately, just sits down beside Zuko and strokes his hair gently.

“Is there anything I can do?” he asks eventually.

Zuko chokes out, “Get Katara?” and tries not to feel guilty for asking for someone else. Uncle has seen him at his worst. But Katara _knows_ this.

Uncle pats him twice on the shoulder and doesn’t ask why Zuko can’t text her or go to her himself, just sweeps out of the room.

Katara comes in a minute later.

“Hey,” she says, and her voice is like cool, clean water over fresh wounds, gentle and healing and still painful. “Arms itching?”

They _more_ than itch, his skin is flat out _screaming_ at him, but he just nods. She drapes an arm over his shoulder and pulls him in, wrapping the other hand around his wrist. He lets go of his ankles and blindly grabs for her hands, and she squeezes tight and doesn’t let go.

“Worse than last time?”

He shrugs. She nods, and he feels it against the top of his head.

“You want me to talk?”

He nods.

“Okay. Did I ever tell you about the time Sokka got two fishhooks stuck in his thumb?”

By the time she finishes the story, he’s relaxed into her hold.

“It’s just so much,” he admits, and she squeezes him.

“I bet.”

“There’s so much blood on this company, and now it’s on my hands, and I don’t know where to start.”

She hums. “You know who I think would give great advice on that?”

Aang pokes his head in the door cautiously, then spots the pair of them and darts across the room to plaster himself against Zuko’s other side. Zuko’s let go of Katara’s hands, so he probably looks a little less like a wreck, but still.

“What’s up, Zuko?”

“It’s so much,” he repeats. “There’s so much wrong that I have to fix.”

“Like what?”

“What do you mean, _like what?_ ”

“I know Azulon’s a horrible company,” Aang explains patiently. “I want to know what specifically you’re thinking about.”

“The way it treats the workers. The fossil fuel business. The undercutting of small businesses.”

“Okay. What will it take to fix the way it treats the workers?”

“Policy rewrites. I’d have to communicate down to the lowest level how I expect things to work so it doesn’t just go from me taking advantage to middle management taking advantage. Put more power back in the people’s hands.”

“So you need them to unionize.”

“I—yeah. I need them to unionize.” He’d even said that, earlier, but the way Aang puts it—obviously none of those changes mean anything if the workers _aren’t_ unionized.

“I know there’s people you can ask about how to do that. And I bet it’s easy with the CEO and the president on board.”

Zuko nods slowly.

“So you need to talk to somebody about unionizing, somebody about divestment from the fossil fuel industry—I know some groups who work on that, I’ll get you some emails—what goes into restructuring Azulon’s business model so it does less damage?”

“I’ll need the _board_ , I think. And they’re all Ozai’s type of people. They’ll never go for it.”

“Can you replace them?”

Zuko blinks. “I don’t know how.”

“I bet Uncle would. Also you probably need to get some of your new fortune into liquid form, and in your own bank account, right? Uncle will know how to do that, too.”

Zuko smiles a little and takes a second to enjoy—for the hundredth time—how all of his friends call Uncle that.

“So! We got a plan?”  
“We got a plan.” After a moment, Zuko adds, “Text the others, will you? They’re probably dying to know how it went.”

They all pile onto the giant penthouse bed. Zuko gives them a rundown of the board meeting, and Katara follows it up with their action plan, because apparently she’d been taking notes.

“I know some people who’ve started unions,” says Suki immediately. “I’ll text them.” She already has her phone out.

“You’re probably going to have to switch out a lot of your middle management too,” says Sokka thoughtfully. “And you’re going to need someone to handle your money. And probably some added security. It’s a good thing you don’t have a Facebook, Zuko, so your school address isn’t public record.”

“I’ll add those to the list of things to ask Uncle,” says Katara. “Your father’s financial advisor was probably implicated in his crimes, huh?”

“Who am I going to switch them _to_?” Zuko runs his hands through his hair roughly. “How am I supposed to trust that whoever I hire isn’t just going to be more of the same?”

“Apart from just hiring all of us, you mean?”

“Serious suggestions only, please. The hell would an engineer do with a management position?”

“Kick ass at it?”

“While _hating every second of it,_ maybe.”

“Hire people with a history of working for nonprofits,” suggests Suki. “Who are clearly working to make the world a better place. You might have to get creative with recruiting, since that kind of person isn’t likely to apply, but…”

“But in the meantime, I think Sokka’s right,” says Aang. “Use _us._ Not for permanent positions or anything. Just to help you juggle until you have new people in place. I’ll talk to Extinction Rebellion, they’re bound to know people who know people to put on your board.”

“Maybe just a couple business majors who are only sort of evil?” puts in Sokka. “People who know the business. Not enough to overrule any decisions, just enough to be able to go ‘no actually this is a dumb plan because of this chain reaction you haven’t spotted.’”

“I’ve got nonprofit connections too,” says Suki. “And if you want, I’ll handle the unionizing process. It doesn’t need you to spearhead it, kind of by definition.”

“You’re in _law school._ ”

“So, I’m already pulling all-nighters, what’s the difference? I’m kidding,” she adds, before Zuko can explain the difference.

“I can probably find you an environmental science person for your board. You need someone to advocate for the land,” says Katara.

“Speak for yourselves, I want _on_ this board,” says Toph, who’s been quiet until now. “Think about what we could _do_.”

His friends are as good as their word. Aang and Suki put out the call to their respective connections, and Katara pores over resumes, comparing them to the resumes of the current board. Toph goes through policy after policy, figuring out where rewrites need to go, where new ones need to be written, and where the policy wasn’t written down in the first place (it isn’t, for example, as if Ozai had ever put in writing that HR was to prioritize hiring part-time workers) and the course of action is to write strongly-worded letters on company stationery saying things like “new management” and “one strike policy” and “zero tolerance.”

He calls Azula to tell her all about it, and Azula says, “What about Ty Lee’s dad?” which is how Zuko learns that Ty Lee’s father already works for Azulon. A quick call to Ty Lee confirms it.

“I won’t swear that he isn’t up to anything shady, he does _work for Azulon_ , after all,” she says. “But what if you put all his correspondence through me?”

Not _all_ his correspondence, they decide. But _enough._ And that’s how Ty Lee gets a job as an executive assistant.

Suki disappears and comes back with a newly-elected union representative and a list of demands for Toph’s stack of policies. Uncle finds him a new financial advisor, and Mai volunteers to randomly audit her files and make sure she isn’t doing anything with Zuko’s newfound wealth that he doesn’t want her doing. Aang and Katara methodically replace the board one by one and then just…don’t leave, working alongside the more experienced activists to help draft environmental-advocacy plans and send pointed letters to elected officials in their limited spare time.

“We’re doing something _important_ here,” Katara tells Zuko earnestly when he expresses concern that his business is taking over their lives. “Su doesn’t need me, she’s been doing this kind of thing for decades. We’re going to have to step back during finals season, and probably while we’re writing our theses. But we’re making a real difference here, effecting real change. No offense, Zuko, but it isn’t about you anymore.” Chastened, he elects to shut up and remind himself that Katara would never be doing this if she didn’t want to.

And Sokka?

Sokka spreads out on Zuko’s dorm room floor with a list of well-vetted charities to set up recurring donations to.

“I figured you’d want to give back,” he explains. “Do something good with the money instead of sitting on it like a dragon.”

Implicit in the statement is _you fucking well better._

“And I figured you wouldn’t have had time to research who would actually do the most good.”

It had, in fact, been eating at Zuko. “Decision paralysis,” he agrees. “There’s a million charities. I’ve just been picking random GoFundMes and paying them off when I can’t sleep.”

“And you can keep doing that! In fact, if I were you, I’d hire someone to scroll through GoFundMe and Reddit and Tumblr and find people begging for cash and just give it to them. Maybe give them a monthly allowance of a hundred thousand or something? Or hire someone you trust.”

“But you have places I can invest in?”

“Yeah, mostly smaller organizations doing grassroots work. So. Border Angels helps people cross the US/Mexico border. Manomet partners with communities to advocate for environment protection. The Prison Policy Initiative does research and advocacy against mass criminalization. Also a big fan of the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights and the Fairbanks Community Food Bank. Speaking of which, I wanted to talk to you about supporting indigenous people specifically.”

“I’m listening.”

“We’re disproportionately affected by shit like that oil pipeline, which I know you’re shutting down but bear with me, and we’re last on pretty much everyone’s list. Canada’s got this reputation for being nice, but they’re _horrible_ to their indigenous population. And the US pretty much just…doesn’t help us when disasters happen. And, not to justify my people’s right to exist, but it would help things like biodiversity, too. There’s so much land that needs to be returned to us, so many places where the ecosystem is falling apart because Native people knew things like, where forests needed to be burned regularly. You have a chance here to make a real, lasting difference.” Sokka looks serious, so different from his usual upbeat self.

“Where do I start?” is all Zuko says.

Sokka grins suddenly, as though he had expected Zuko to fight him. “I want to introduce you to my Gran-Gran and the other elders, so you can talk directly to them about what they need. Then we can branch out to other indigenous populations. Now, people are always saying ‘Ozai Himura could single-handedly end world hunger’ but let’s talk about how to _actually do that._ ”

“So I’m sure you’ve heard about how my dad’s in prison and I run the company now,” says Zuko. “But before you try to kick the shit out of me again, I promise I’m trying to do better things with it. We’re firing the board and redesigning the business model to prioritize the workers.”

“And, what, you want a cookie? Or are you here to pay reparations?”

“Do you _want_ reparations? Because I could set you up so you never have to work again.”

“No.” Jet looks offended, which was about what Zuko had expected. “I’m not living beholden to _you._ I have _standards._ And it’s not like you can bring my fucking parents back.”

“Right. So no. I wanted to give you an open invitation to write directly to me if you see something you think I should be fixing. Whether some manager has found a loophole in the new policies to make my workers’ lives hell, or something that has nothing to do with Azulon at all.” He passes Jet a card with his new company email on it. “In case this ever starts going to my ego, I know you’ll always be around to knock me down a peg.” He smirks.

“You know,” says Jet, pocketing the card and staring at him, “We’ll never be friends, but I’d probably let you give me that blowjob now, Himura.” He even pronounces it almost right. Closer to right, anyway.

“I have to go to class, but you have my email,” says Zuko, and Jet smirks back.

“You know, I stand by what I said, but I wouldn’t turn down an early birthday present. Couple thousand. Drop in the bucket.”

“Yeah, sure. I’ll Venmo you or something.”

“I should count myself lucky, I suppose, that you grace me with your presence?”

“You should count yourself lucky you only had your ribs kicked in. He could have killed you.”

“Why are you here?” says Ozai. He probably means it to come out as a snarl, but he just sounds tired. And nobody can look particularly threatening in prison orange with a phone held to their ear.

“To tell the truth,” says Zuko. He feels like his heart should be beating its way out of his chest, but he’s actually as calm as he’s ever been. Partly because he’s rehearsed what he wants to say so he doesn’t forget anything, but partly because…Ozai can’t hurt him.

“The truth? From the other side of a plexiglass partition? This should be good.”

He can’t reach out and yank Zuko into an open flame, but he also can’t force him to come home, he can’t manipulate Azula, he can’t somehow have Zuko declared incompetent and placed under a conservatorship or any number of things that Zuko has dreamt up while in depression spirals over the years. Zuko’s spent so long watching his father buy his way out of everything that at some point he stopped believing there was anyone who didn’t have a price.

But Ozai doesn’t have his money anymore. It turns out pissing off the entire board was a bite too large even for him. And now, he can finally say everything he’s wanted to say since he figured his shit out in therapy.

“For so long, all I wanted was for you to love me, to accept me. You, my father, who held me down in an open flame just for talking out of turn. How could you possibly justify burning a child’s face?”

“It was to teach you respect!” snaps Ozai.

“No. It was cruel. And it was wrong. And what about Azula? You taught her to control everyone around her, and then you told her she was worthless when she had a human emotion.”

“She was weak. I gave her everything, and she proved she would never be strong enough to truly carry on my work. It’s a pity.”

“If I have anything to say about it, she’ll never have to.”

“Who else is going to do it? _You?_ ”

Zuko actually laughs. “Do you not _know_? Is no one loyal enough to visit you?” It’s an unanticipated burst of schadenfreude to be able to look at him and say, “You left your company to _me_ , Father.” He has the great pleasure of watching Ozai blanch.

“I _disowned_ you!”

“I’m sure you cut me out of the will, and if you’re claiming me as a dependent on your taxes you’re doing it illegally because Uncle and I pay all my expenses. I imagine you left me on your insurance out of laziness. But there’s nothing legally making you no longer my father. And you didn’t change the line in your contract saying if you were incapacitated, your position went to your direct descendant. Too arrogant to think anyone would ever catch on to your embezzlement scheme?”

“You worthless, weak little misfit,” Ozai growls. “You’ll run my company into the _ground_.”

“From your perspective? Probably. I’m starting off by letting the employees unionize.” Zuko grins. Ozai looks apoplectic. “Then we’re going to pour the money into supporting small businesses, saving the earth, and pulling people out of poverty.”

“Your uncle has gotten to you, hasn’t he?” Ozai spits, clearly intending it as an insult.

Zuko just smiles. “Yes. He has.”

“Oh, Zuko,” Uncle chuckles when Zuko tells him about the conversation. “I assure you, this is _all_ you. You’re a better, braver, kinder man than I ever have been. It’s an honor to claim any of the credit at all for raising you.”

“ _Uncle_ ,” starts Zuko, but is interrupted by Azula, who yells,

“Just _take the compliment_!” from the background of the Skype call. Zuko flushes and casts about for something else to say.

“Can you imagine if you’d told me at fifteen that this was what my life was going to be?”

“I would never have dared believe it,” says Uncle happily. “You’re building a new world.”

“Yeah.” Zuko grins. “We are.”

A thousand miles away, a woman is rereading a newspaper article, her bagel and cup of tea forgotten on the desk beside her.

“Sweetheart, I’m headed out. Kiyi’s down for her nap.” The man stops as he registers her focus on the screen in front of her. “Everything okay?”

“ _Noren_.” Tears overflow the woman’s face all at once, and Noren rushes to her side, pulling her close. “I think I’m finally _safe._ ”

He holds her until the tears stop, skimming the article briefly over the top of her head and pressing a kiss to her hair. When she finally pulls away to wipe at her face with her sleeve, he says softly, “What do you want to do?”

Ursa looks into his eyes and sees no judgment, only the same infinite patience that had originally won her heart.

“I want to see Zuko,” she says. “I want to see my son.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All of Sokka’s organizations were on Fandom Trumps Hate’s list either [this year](https://fandomtrumpshate.dreamwidth.org/32768.html) or [last](https://fandomtrumpshate.dreamwidth.org/20257.html).
> 
> • [Border Angels](https://www.borderangels.org/)   
> • [Manomet](https://www.manomet.org/)   
> • [Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights](https://www.theyoungcenter.org/)   
> • [Fairbanks Community Food Bank](https://www.fairbanksfoodbank.org/) (serving central Alaska)   
> • [Prison Policy Initiative](https://www.prisonpolicy.org/)   
> Some tumblr thoughts about Native people and biodiversity  
> [(link)](https://quousque.tumblr.com/post/638798131758284800/wondermumbles-fandomsandfeminism-you-know-what)  
> [(link)](https://huanism.tumblr.com/post/640741626469400576/meanwhile-foodies-are-pilfering-and-destroying)
> 
> I wrote Disrespect because I needed to, because even though I’d barely even read any ATLA fic, it was the medium I needed to process one day in September 2020. I didn’t expect it to get more than a handful of kudos/comments.
> 
> Instead, it rapidly climbed to the most popular of my work, the first fic of mine to break a thousand kudos. And because I’m a slut for validation, here we are, 57,000 words later—my longest series by almost 15K. Disrespect is my top work in kudos and second in bookmarks, comment threads, and hits. Save is actually my top in comment threads. 
> 
> And beyond the numbers, the _types_ of comments I’ve gotten have been jaw-dropping. Some of you have told me you found one of these fics right when you needed it. Some of you have told me these fics made you realize something, or gave you words to explain it. One of you isn’t in this fandom, but follows the series anyway. It’s been humbling and amazing. Thank you for taking this journey with me.
> 
> I know some of you are sad to see this series end. I won’t swear to never revisit this universe, maybe for the further adventures of a side character, or a spinoff, but this arc is complete. If I ever do come back to it, I’ll put the fic temporarily in the series so y’all subscribers get the notification, and then shift to “inspired by” so it appears at the bottom here. I also strongly encourage you to check out [my tumblr’s](https://khashanakalashtar.tumblr.com/) pinned post for news about my next project.


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